Asbestos Textile Institute Air Hygiene Committee Meeting with Company Doctors on Examinations and Fiber Standards (1955)

Three pages of minutes of the Asbestos Textile Institute's Air Hygiene Committee meeting of June 10, 1955, signed by H. M. Jackson of Johns-Manville as chairman. Company doctors, among them J-M's medical director Dr. Kenneth W. Smith and Dr. Paul Cartier of Quebec, met as guests and agreed that "complete pre-employment and periodic annual examinations are essential," with full-size chest X-rays, lung function tests and work histories. They agreed on four X-ray classes (negative or borderline, early, moderate, advanced) and that there were usually "no significant X-ray changes in less than five years of asbestos exposure."

What it shows

The committee opened by stating that the Saranac Laboratory research "clearly shows the long fibres (10 microns and longer) to be the fibrotic producing agent," so past surveys that counted only dust particles were "practically without value." The members noted that most state codes set the asbestos limit at five million particles per cubic foot and expected that "for a period of time, undoubtedly, we will be subject to two standards," the states' and their own. New Jersey was revising its threshold limit values, and "Copies of the Saranac reports and opinions have been presented to the state officials." The doctors also agreed that asbestos bodies in the lung were not a sign of disease, "but only of the body defense mechanism."

In Johns-Manville's chronology

Johns-Manville's own chronology of what the company knew describes this document as follows:

At ATI Hygiene Committee Meeting held 6/10/55, K. Smith urged annual exams rather than every three years, reported that AMA advocated disclosures.

Editor's note: J-M's description says Dr. K. W. Smith urged annual examinations rather than examinations every three years and reported that the AMA advocated disclosure. The minutes record annual examinations as a point the doctors agreed on together, and mention no three-year schedule, no AMA position and no discussion of disclosure.